


wild mountain thyme (among blooming heather)

by Aurelie (NowImJustSomebodyThat)



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Family Reunions, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Non-Linear Narrative, Original Character Death(s), Post-Canon, Reunions, Safe for cast & crew, Spoilers for S02E102
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-17
Updated: 2020-07-17
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:42:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,107
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25338571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NowImJustSomebodyThat/pseuds/Aurelie
Summary: Vilya's memories do not all come back at once
Relationships: Korrin/Vilya (Critical Role)
Comments: 103
Kudos: 479





	wild mountain thyme (among blooming heather)

**Author's Note:**

> Title from 'Wild Mountain Thyme' by The Longest Johns.
> 
> So, uh, its 3am. I have 0 regrets. I have many tears.

“I've been here twenty-five years. I'm not Viridian. I'm from Tal'Dorei. My name is Vilya.”

“That’s such a pretty name!” The blue tiefling - Jester, right, Jester, like the clown - exclaims, taking her shaking hands with nonchalance. The cool blue skin is grounding as decades tumble into her head like a spilt bowl of beads, plinking into place with a rumble that makes her want to throw up. 

“I- oh _gods_ -“

Jester cups her face, awfully tender and painstakingly gentle. “It’s alright, all you need to do is breathe. Just breathe. You’re going to be fine.”

~~

“You’re going to be fine.” Vilya says, pressing a kiss to her daughter’s forehead, holding her close to her chest. “And I won’t be long. I’ll be back before you know it.”

Keyleth frowns, clumsily pushing down the hairs that were pushed out of place. She looks up at Vilya, chubby fingers clinging to Vilya’s clothes, and Vilya has the terrible urge to forgo all of this and stay with her, with her daughter and husband and let things be. 

But the world has always been far too big to leave unaccompanied. Almost like a toddler, wanting and unable to speak the wants, needing and unable to speak the needs. And it has always needed an Archdruid to clear the roots of past mistakes, to remind kings that their thrones are food for forests. And other such dramatic things. Korrin always had a better way with words. 

“I don’t want you to go.” Keyleth says, eyes watering enough to make Vilya’s heart hurt, and Vilya catches a few errant tears on the tips of her fingers. “You said you’re going to come back, but what if you don’t? What if I never see you again? Like I know you’re super strong and have been prac- practising for years but, Mama, what if you _don’t?_ ”

Vilya brushes her hands through her daughter’s red hair, smiling softly. “Melora will guide and protect me, and grant me those to aid me in my path. I promise, Keyleth, on the soil, sky and sea, I will be coming back to you. Okay?”

Keyleth squints up at her, then curls into her usual spot in Vilya’s lap. “Okay.”

~~

“Okay. I’m okay. I.. I think.” Vilya inhales a sharp breath, suddenly aware of Caduceus pressed behind her, a soft warmth that helps things settle into place. 

“Good. You’re doing good.” She feels and hears him say that, a soft rumbling like a cat’s purring reverberating through her chest and down her arms. 

The others are all giving her space, leaving her to the clerics. She appreciates it. It’s a lot to deal with when you realise you’re- and you-

She can’t say it. 

“Do you want to talk about it?” Veth asks. “About who you are?”

Are, not were, as if twenty five years is nothing and she is simply a person and not a legacy, not the next step in ancient tradition that was meant to fall upon her, as it had been passed on from her mother, and would be passed on to her dau- to Keyleth. 

Oh gods. 

_Keyleth._

~~

“Keyleth. Keyleth, get _down_.” Keyleth is four and in a tree, laughing as she climbs through the branches. It’s lucky that Vilya had the sense to braid her hair this morning, otherwise it would be catching in the branches of the oak tree, tangling amongst the leaves and they may be Druids but there is no need to run around looking like a fox caught in the shrubbery.

“Come get me, Mama!” Keyleth laughs, foot dangling a little as she pulls herself up further. Her grip slips, just enough to give Vilya the fright of her life, but Keyleth only laughs harder and races through the branches, clambering higher and higher.

Vilya huffs, and follows. The branches of this tree are so worn with the brush of children’s fingertips that finger holds have begun to form, and it is these finger holds that Vilya reaches for, pulling herself up a familiar path and towards her daughter, who turns back and squeals with delight.

“You’re slow, Mama! Come on! Come get me!” Vilya thinks for a second from her place at the lowest of branches and grins. She inhales, and folds herself into the form of a small red-tinged squirrel. Keyleth, watching intently, giggles and races further, but her clumsy hands and small arms are no match for Vilya’s wildshape, and soon Vilya - in a squirrel form, to be fair - is now sitting in the branches just above Keyleth, tail swinging just above her daughter’s nose. Vilya looks up for a branch that is slightly more solid, and sees one as thick as her torso a half meter up. She scurries up, Keyleth laughing as she tries to swipe at her bushy tail, and shifts back on the thicker branch, legs swinging.

“Come on, sweetpea.” Vilya says, one hand reaching down for her daughter.

Keyleth’s face twists into her best impression of a frown. “That’s cheating, Mama.” Keyleth reaches anyway, and Vilya closes the gap, pulling her up with a soft laugh. Keyleth settles immediately on her lap, curling against Vilya’s chest. Vilya’s hands go to her braid absentmindedly, and trace the rises and falls of her hair, catching on the few beads and ornaments she allows her to wear.

“Mhm, because you starting first is very fair.” 

“But it is, Mama! I have little arms. See?” She holds up her arms, and Vilya shoves her face in her palms. They smell of sap and dirt and the thyme they picked this morning. “And I can’t turn into a squirrel.” Keyleth’s arms fall around her shoulders, and Vilya scoots her closer, Vilya herself shifting so that her back is against the trunk.

“The squirrel comes with practise, sweetpea. Your father and I have talked about this.” Keyleth wrinkles her nose.

“But I like being a puppy more. I wish puppies could climb trees, then I wouldn’t have to be a squirrel.” She sounds awfully dejected, then her expression changes. “Mama, why can’t puppies climb trees?”

Vilya laughs. “You will have to ask Melora that, not me. I am not the mother of puppies.”

“No, you’re my Mama!”

“Exactly.”

“And you’ll always be my Mama, no matter what happens! You could- you could- you could be a _thousand_ years old and you’ll still be my Mama!” In her excitement, Keyleth has scooted the smallest bit back, and the colours of the sunset catch on the freckles beginning to form on the bridge of her nose and cheekbones. It reminds Vilya of the pollen on bees, streaks of yellow and orange left by honeybees who bear too much weight, specks caught on fingertips and staining everything in sight.

Vilya presses a kiss to the crown of her head, and pulls her back close as the sun begins to set past the mountain range. “Exactly, Keyleth. I will always be your mama. Now, we should get down.”

“Aw! I don’t want to!”

~~

“I don’t want to. I don’t want to sleep. What- what if I forget again?” Vilya looks, frantic and afraid, at the others. They’ve moved back closer, knees touching knees, and it should be overbearing to be so crowded so soon after realising everything she has lost, but Jester’s cool hand and Caduceus’ soft hold is grounding, sensations she knows are real and will always be real, sensations and truths that this thrice-cursed beast cannot take from her.

“We can fix it, remember? Caduceus just fixed it, and in the morning Jester will be able to do so as well. You’re not going to forget your past.” The human- Beauregard, the one who thought running up to a spectre was a good idea - says directly opposite her, and Vilya shakes her head.

“That’s not, that’s not important. I don’t care about my past, or most of it at least. There’s- I left people _behind_.” She looks at them, each in turn. “I… I was a mother.” Out of the corner of her eye, she sees Veth flinch. “I was married.” Yasha flinches.

“Was? Are they dead?” Yasha says, tentatively, like she knows how this discussion is meant to go.

Vilya shakes her head. “No, I mean- _gods_ , I wouldn’t know would I? He was- Korrin, my husband, was alive when I left.”

“Then why do you say ‘was married’? You still are.” Yasha continues.

Vilya laughs with none of the joy. “Why would he wait for me?”

~~

“Why would he wait for me?” Vilya, eighteen and perhaps not the best at social graces, asks Ador, a verdant green tiefling who is currently busy whittling a piece of wood in what looks like a bear. Or a really large dwarf. It’s hard to tell at the moment.

Ador sighs, black hair falling a little out of its topknot. They turn to her, face flat. “Wow, Vilya, why would the son of the headmaster's right hand man wait for you?” They say, voice heavy with sarcasm.

“Don’t be a dickhead.”

“My horns grew that way, dumbass.” Said horns, the soft circular curve of a ram’s, are currently laden with flower chains, courting gifts from one of the humans of their little family. Vilya must not be stealthy with her staring, because Ador tilts their head, a self-assured expression clear on their face. “Not going to ask about the roses and adornments?”

“You look like someone had an accident with _Druidcraft_.”

Ador tsks. “You should watch your tongue, Vilya. I know Korrin thinks you're the next great thing since Melora and Erathis’ nuptials, but even he won’t think your scathing wit is attractive.”

Vilya freezes. “He what.”

“Kord’s dick and balls, are you _serious_? Did you seriously not know that he cares for you?” Ador stands, pupiless eyes wide. They wave their hands at her. “Go, go! He’s meant to leave with his father to go find a suitable druid girl.”

Panic fills her body. “I won’t make it.”

“You will if you run! Now go!”

She runs. People clearly see her coming and step aside, some with knowing looks, others clearly tired of the two of them dancing around each other. How on soil, sea and sky did everyone else know that he had feelings for her except for her? She would have really appreciated the pointer. Especially seeing as she’s held a torch for him for years. 

She slips on a stone, but keeps going, the jolt in her knee something to deal with later. She can see them, can see the gathering of people around the largest tree, the lifting of a staff that glows green, the back of Korrin’s head. She slips, breaks a stick. He turns, eyes widening as he sees her.

She raises an arm. “Wait!”

~~

“Wait. Wait, Vilya, hold on.” Vilya’s stumbling through the woods, lost and dazed and panicking, always panicking, she cannot sit still and she wants to scream because she’s not where she is meant to be and there is no way to get back because she doesn’t even know if she is wanted, and she wants to scream but she chokes it down because this island is violent and would chew her alive, and she is weak- so weak, couldn’t remember her name or her husband or her _child_ -

Strong hands wrap around her forearms, and she is wrenched out of her spiral by Yasha, who immediately starts speaking. “Come on, Vilya, just breathe. Deep breathes in and out. In, one, two, three, out, one, two, three.”

They go through the motions for a minute, until Vilya’s breaths are more regular, then another minute more, until Vilya stops shaking. She exhales with a finality, then looks up at Yasha. “Thank you, Yasha.”

Yasha doesn’t smile, instead makes a face that seems to say more than it should. “It’s fine. The others, they, ah, oh I’m not good at this.” She looks around, then sits on a fairly inconspicuous log. “This is a sitting down conversation.”

Vilya sits, looking at her, the mismatched eyes, the recently healed scars, the tangled, faded hair, the taste of lightning in the air. “You were saying something about the others?”

“I’ve been in a situation similar to this. Ah, well, when I say similar, it’s a little complicated. But you seemed really heartbroken about your husband-”

Anger flares. “Don’t. I don’t need some misplaced pity telling me that it’s all going to be okay. I have been gone for over twenty years, Yasha.”

“I’d wait that long.” Yasha blurts out, and Vilya starts. “Even if I got married, there’d be a part of me that would be so, _so_ happy if my wife came back.” She continues.

“Your wife?”

“Zuala. She was killed, and-” She sighs. “And I ran, and every day I think of what I could have done differently. I know that she is dead, because the people which took her from me are thorough in everything they do, and there is nothing that I can do to bring her back.” Yasha’s eyes are shining in the moonlight where she stares straight ahead, and Vilya puts a hand on her shoulder, comforting.

“I’m so sorry. That is- I would never wish that on anyone.”

Yasha turns to look at her. “If- if she came back to me? After a year, or ten, or even a hundred if I live that long, I would be so glad to see her. You don’t- you don’t just fall out of a love like that, Vilya. Take this from a widow. Your husband would be so happy to see you, even after all this time.”

“I just feel so out of place. My daughter, she’d be forty. I- I would have missed so much.”

Yasha places one hand on her shoulder. “Well, after we stop Vokodo from taking any more memories, we’re going to find out where you live and get you home. We have a habit of returning lost or taken things to their rightful place.”

Vilya laughs wetly. “Just another notch on the belt.”

“If you want, we can trade stories to make it hurt less. You can tell me about your husband and daughter. I’ll tell you about the best day of my life.”

~~

“I’ll tell you about the best day of my life.” Ophelia giggles into her mead. The satyr is clearly three sheets to the wind, and her ivory horns keep catching on Vilya’s coat when she leans against her shoulder, but the revelry is welcomed. Tomorrow, they head into the Elemental Plane of Water, and Vilya faces the last challenge. She is so close, so close to the mantle and the title and going back home after all this time.

She _had_ asked them to not get too drunk before such a complex and unknown fight, but Ophelia’s both a heavyweight and a cleric who figured out _Remove Poison_ works for alcohol abuse, so she should be fine.

Their brawlers, Jade and Prim, are waltzing by the lights of lanterns, the soft sounds of music filling the space. It’s always rather hilarious to watch them waltz, Jade’s dwarf stature meaning their resident firbolg has to bend almost over, the tops of her velveteen ears just touching Jade’s head. Jade has undone her hair, and the light of the lanterns is catching on the parts of her hair and skin that have turned into the crystal jade, a condition that she’s always sworn was an honour to bear, though she is the first one in generations to be born with it, and may, in fact, be the last.

Their resident maniac, Clank, is passed out on top of their other resident maniac, Futz. The two lizardfolk are sprawled over the log closest to a small, though mighty, fire, basking in the heat and an alcohol-induced nap. Clank snorts and rolls over, landing on Futz’s head, who squawks in the way lizards sometimes do, the two of them immediately devolving into an argument that is made up almost entirely of hisses.

“Vilya, Vil, you gotta listen to this, trust me, best day of my life.” Ophelia says into her shoulder, and Vilya cards her hands through her thick hair, a silent acknowledgement. “Okay, so, I’m sitting in a tavern, right, with this godawful pants on trying to hide my hooves, right? Because I’m being hunted by these hunters, right, who got a deal from a local lord to turn me into a roast, which is _not cool_ , and they see me in the crowd.” Vilya begins to pay attention. This is beginning to sound familiar. “I see them, they see me. I go ‘oh shit!’ but they catch me there and then, right? And they’re about to kill me, in the tavern might I add, when this half-elf woman leaps over a table and guess what? Guess what she does?”

Vilya knows what the half-elf in this story does, because she _is_ the half-elf in this story. She had barely made it down the mountain when she had seen Ophelia thrown to the ground, none of the other patrons bothering to so much as glance as she screamed for help. What else is a druid to do, other than turn into a bear and chase the assaulters off?

“Let me guess, she turns into a bear?”

“Yeah! Into a whole bear! And she tells them to fuck off! But, like, as a bear, and she pulls me off the floor and buys me a drink, and I’ve travelled with her ever since.”

Vilya looks into her cup of mulled wine. “Is there a reason you’re telling me this?”

“Because you look sad. You don’t deserve to be sad.”

“We might die tomorrow. We could lose, I could be too weak.”

Ophelia snorts, hooves clanking against the wood with the motion. “Oh please, we’re going to be fine. You’ve already beaten earth, air and fire. A little water never hurt anybody.”

~~

“A little water never hurt anybody.” Veth says, offering her a small flask of water. Vilya’s sleep has been restless and awful, memories drawing themselves to the surface. She must look the mess she feels, because every glance in her direction is laden with pity that she does not know how to deal with. She is Vilya, heir to the Ma-

No, no she is not the heir to the Mantle. She failed. She is just Vilya.

“Okay, I lied, a little water may not hurt anybody but Fjord and I have sort of drowned before so no swimming, okay?” Veth continues, shaking the water flask, and Vilya cannot tell if she is joking or not.

“Please be joking.” She does not take the flask.

“Nope!” Veth takes a drink, and sits beside her. The others are packing up camp, and have clearly put Veth on elf-sitting duty. “My son is five. His name is Luc, and he likes using crossbows, like his mother.” She says that with fondness, like she’s taught him how to play an instrument or sing a song. Then again, Vilya has always been proud that Keyleth copied her wolf form before Korrin’s bear, even if it was more a puppy than a wolf, so she can’t quite complain.

“Five? My daughter was five when I left.”

Veth doesn’t ask how long it has been, or whether she misses her. Instead, she responds in the way only another mother can understand. “My son got stuck in the roof once. Not on, in the roof.” She offers the flask again.

Vilya takes it, taking a sip.“I used to chase my daughter out of trees by turning into squirrels.”

Veth pulls out a small loaf of bread, offering. “Luc once started a fire when he got into my husband’s workspace- we are alchemists by trade and all, so a lot of nasty things in there.”

Vilya, caught up in recollecting pleasant memories, takes the bread and eats a small morsel. “When Keyleth first showed signs of her power, she sneezed and started a small grass fire.”

“I gave my son a blink dog as an animal companion.”

Vilya stops. “You gave your- you gave a _five year old_ a blink dog as an animal companion.”

Veth shrugs. “What else do you give a five year old halfling who’s mother is a sneaky, tinkering meddler who travels with a bunch of assholes who care only about each other?”

Vilya blinks hard. “Adventuring parties are some of the most obscure ways to make friends.”

Veth nods, fiddling with one of the buttons on her dress. Beau and Fjord seem to be debating something, and Vilya must be beginning to fall back into old habits, because she has the urge to throw an acorn between them.

Veth throws a copper piece between them. Beau raises her arms, clearly yelling something at her. “Fighting a beast with a bunch of nobodies. A tried and true recipe.”

~~

“A tried and true recipe. All we have to do now is wait a little bit and we’ll know.” The elderly healer, Thuda, says. She hobbles over from the table she was working on, leaving the concoction of herbs and Druidic magic to the side to take her place back at the dining table, where two mugs of herbal tea sit, one of them held firmly in Vilya’s grasp.

“Are you sure we’re going to find out what the problem is with this? It feels fairly rudimentary.” She says, unconvinced. Thuda throws a terrifying glare her way.

“I am simply crossing off a feeling I have, young one. Don’t rush perfection, or we could make this sickness of yours even worse. An ill feeling in the gut could become something else entirely! Ah! You young ones, always thinking the world will simply answer your requests to make sense. Would you ask the Stormlord to stop raging!?” Thuda rambles, hands in the air.

“My apologies, Healer Thuda, I was simply confirming with you that this was the best way to do so, for my own personal reference.”

Thuda gives her a very unimpressed look. “That diplomacy works better coming from your husband. Stick to being brutally honest about things, it suits you better.”

The mixture bubbles. It bubbles, and a few odd whorls of a deep green smoke begin to emanate from the bowl. “Is that meant to happen?” Vilya asks, taking a sip of her tea.

Thuda hurries to the bowl, white braids swinging as she moves. She picks it up, stares deeply into it, and lets out a low and long sigh. “Well, it depends. I now know what’s wrong with you, but you might not like the answer.” 

Vilya scoffs. “Try me.”

“You’re pregnant.”

Vilya drops the mug. It crashes against the table, shattering and spilling the tea everywhere. “What.”

“Congratulations. You’re with child. I strongly recommend tellin’ him sooner rather than later, it makes preparations a lot easier.” Thuda says, completely unaware that Vilya is beginning to stand.

“I- _pregnant._ ” She can’t be pregnant, not now, not like this. She’s still getting over the whole accidental incident she caused involving the giant owl and a visiting druid from the Earth Ashari, who swore to never return because it was populated by ‘rambunctious and destructive spirits who are masquerading as druids, and who have clearly desecrated your heir!’. She can’t be a mother, not when people expect brute when she speaks after spending so long trying to prove that she was just as good a choice as any other heir. She cannot be soft like her own mother was, she cannot whisper sweet nothings into the ear of a newborn. She prefers being a direwolf most of the time, for Melora’s sake! What about that gives her any of the qualities that make a good mother?

“Yes, it tends to be the result of two people getting in bed with each other. Don’t worry, I’ll still be kickin’ for the little one’s first words and all that.”

“Pregnant.” Thuda finally turns around and sees the panic on her face.

“Don’t you dare freak out in here, or I swear I’ll get your husband! Kord’s dick and balls, Vilya. It’s a baby not a fire drake! For cryin’ out loud, druids your age wouldn’t know a good thing-”

“But I’m an awful person.”

“If it bit them on the ar- Did you say you weren’t a _good person_ ? Vilya, don’t be daft. You’re a great person, and a brilliant leader, and you’re the right amount of stubbornness to knock some heads into the other Ashari folk. You _are_ a good person. Yes, you’re a bit crass and perhaps you tend to think with your Beast Shapes more than a druid ought to, but you are a good person. And, sure, it’s going to be tricky, what with your Aramenté within the next few years and all that. But you forget. We are a community, and that little heir in your belly is going to receive the best this community has to offer. Understand?”

Vilya nods, unable to speak.

“Good, now, d’you want to go tell your husband, or would you like another cup of tea for the nerves?”

“I, ah, I might take another cup of tea. I should tell my mother first.”

Thuda laughs. “That’s a measure of courage, tellin’ her that you’re pregnant. Sure you don’t want me to do so?”

Vilya shakes her head. “I should tell her.”

~~

“I should tell her. Like, I really should. She lives on Tal’Dorei, she’s part of the _Council_ , you guys. We should totally tell Allura, like, ‘hey! We found this druid named Vilya, she went missing in the-’ what was it again?”

Vilya smiles at Jester. It’s kind of them to attempt to find out what happened to her family, even though all her questions about how they know a member of the Tal'Dorei council have been answered with some form of misdirection. But from what she has heard of Allura, only stories about her kindness and hair and ‘cool wizard shit’, Vilya feels an odd sort of kinship with her. And the Nein trusts her, so it cannot be the worst thing in the world. “Elemental Plane of Water, fighting a kraken, while undertaking an important pilgrimage that is one of the pillars of my society’s structure.”

Jester frowns, mouth twisting to one side. “You went missing fighting an angry space squid-”

Beau rubs her temples. “That is not at all what she said. We really should be writing this down.”

“Come _on_ , Beau, I can cast _Sending_ multiple times. We don’t really need to practise.”

Fjord shakes his head. “This is important, Jes-”

“I know that!”

“I know you know, but being succinct is probably a good idea. Like that time you asked Yeza about the tripod, remember?”

Veth grins. “Caveman speak! Come on, Jessie, it’ll be nice and simple.” Veth puts on a terrible approximation of Jester’s accent. “‘Hi! Question! Druid, found, Rumblecusp. Ashari. Know? Lost memories. Daughter Keyleth. Aramenté failed. Need help. Angry fake god. Send reinforcements.’ See? Look how easy that was.”

Jester glares at Veth. “That is _awful_.”

“To be fair, if I got that message from Jester, I’d assume she was being mind controlled.” Caleb adds, and Jester bounces, gesturing vaguely at him.

“See? See? I have a brand, Veth. I have to use _at least_ two castings of _Sending_ otherwise people will think I’m mind controlled, or worse! They’ll think I’m boring.”

Yasha interrupts. “Just let her do it her way, what can go wrong?”

Everyone gives Yasha a very loaded look. They clearly know what can and will go wrong when Jester is in charge of informing people of things via _Sending_.

Fjord holds up his hands. “Alright, Jes, hit it.”

Jester grins, raising a hand. She draws a rather unusual sigil in the air, and her eyes glaze over purple as she speaks. “Hi Allura! It’s Jester. We’re alive. Question. Druid named Vilya. Found on Rumblecusp, lost memories. Doing Aramenté. Know her? Please respond.” Jester grins, holding up the edges of her skirts and curtseying, clearly proud of her effort.

Fjord interjects, four fingers standing up on one hand. “You have four more words.”

Jester panics. “Ah! Fuck! Oh jeez.”

“And that’s the four.” Fjord nods. Beau is the one who breaks first, cackling into Yasha’s shoulder.

Jester frowns, then stops, head tilting to one side. “Huh.”

Caduceus tilts his head at her. “What’s huh, Jester?”

She hmms, hands on hips. “I don’t think I’ve heard Allura say fuck before.”

Beau frowns. “Why did she say fuck? Allura never says fuck. She says, like, whoopsie daisy and shit like that.”

“Well, her response went like this.” Jester clears her throat, and puts on a marginally more respectable accent. “‘Oh fuck. Oh fuck, Kima, they found Keyleth’s mum. Yeah, the kids that Yussa adopted. Don’t ask me how! They’re on Rumblecusp. Fuck, we need-’ and then it cut off because, like, limits and things.”

More discussion follows, but Vilya doesn’t listen, doesn’t care, because Jester confirms something Vilya has been terrified about confirming since she got her memories back two days ago.

Keyleth is alive.

And if Keyleth is alive, all these years later, it means- by the gods, it means-

“Vilya, we can get you home! Can you believe it?” Jester says, bouncing over. “You’re going to see your daughter and your husband and you can go home to Zephrah!” She stops. “Vilya. Are you okay?”

“Yes, yes, I’m okay. I.. I am excited to go home, to see my family again…”

Jester’s gaze softens. “But?”

Vilya inhales, then exhales all of her doubt. “There is something I have to do first.”

~~

“There is something I have to do, first.” Vilya says, the night before she and her companions are to plunge into the Elemental Plane of Water, and face the kraken on the other side.

“Vil, you need to sleep.” Ophelia says, checking over the diamonds they have brought along.

“I will, I just want to… you know.” Vilya shrugs. They know what she means. She reaches into her pack, pulling out a mirror and a small bracelet, and heads to somewhere separate from the others. The water around the city is still, for a sea that is, and the moon above is bright and full. She looks at it, suddenly wishing that Korrin was here with her. But then Keyleth would have had to endure the trip, and nothing would have been worse for her.

Vilya sits at the edge of the city, and entwines Keyleth’s bracelet in one hand. In the other, she holds the mirror, and holds it so that it is eye level. She inhales, and speaks aloud. “Show me Keyleth, daughter of Vilya.”

The mirror shimmers, the sound of laughter slowly growing louder, and Vilya bites back tears as the image clears. Keyleth, growing into the woman Vilya wishes she could experience for herself, kneeling over a patch of dirt and coaxing a few plants to full height, whispering encouragement as the little flowers unfurl in golds and reds and pinks. 

“There we go.” Keyleth says. “Exactly what we’re after. Now, you have to promise me to keep like this until Mum comes back, okay?”

The sob doesn’t hold back, and Vilya curls up on herself, knees to chest, as Keyleth debates whether or not she should ask Korrin to check that they listened to her. “Oh, sweetpea, I’m coming, I promise.”

“You okay?” Vilya looks up, wiping away at her tears. Prim looks at her, face soft. 

“I’ve missed so much of Keyleth’s life, Prim.” She explains, showing her the mirror, and Prim exhales softly. 

“What a dear.” Prim moves to sit beside her, and presses a warm, softly furred face into her neck. “Think, Vilya, one more challenge and you can go home. That’s it. One measly kraken, a short ceremony, and she’ll be there to tell you how proud you make her and all the things you can do with her now.”

In the mirror, Keyleth stands and begins to dust off her knees. “Well, Dad wanted me to practise my spells, again.” The last part of the sentence is said with an awful sadness, and Vilya feels the familiar urge of longing, the urge to reach out to her daughter and tell her that it’s all going to be fine, that she’ll be home soon.

“She reminds me of you.” Prim says. “In an odd sort of way.”

“How so?”

“I’ve seen you look at little sprouts the same way.” Prim adjusts so that they can both see Keyleth, now going through the meditation exercises young Druids learn before gaining the ability to Wildshape. “She is going to make you so proud, Vilya.”

“She already has.”

~~

“She already has. Sort of. Kinda. I guess?” Jester says, shrugging. “I heard a new voice that was very determined to tell me to Wait. Here. And she sounded _mad_ , you guys. But not, like, mad at us. Mad at Vokodo.” 

Vilya and the Nein are standing at the outskirts of the camp, waiting by the treeline, as ordered by the disembodied voice that gave very explicit instructions as to what they were doing. From the sounds of it, Jester’s early morning _Sending_ had sparked a series of repercussions that involved a fair amount of people, and not even eight hours later they were sitting at the edge of the camp waiting for something.

Beau and Caleb are focused on a book, attempting to figure out who was going to arrive, and how. Yasha, Jester and Veth are passing the time talking and telling stories, most of them clearly fictional - who would try to throw money at a white dragon? Fjord and Caduceus are meditating, attempting to find answers to the Vokodo problem by consulting the Wildmother. Vilya would join them, but the nerves rumbling in her gut would overtake any sense of calm either of them happened to find.

It is better if she stayed away.

“You know, we never considered that the trees are important. Vilya can walk through trees.” Beau suggests, and Caleb frowns. He must have done that often enough that his face got used to it, though he had not done so often around Vilya. Clearly he has suffered - a lot of them walk with the weight of it, though she is never going to ask - but his kindness and willingness to do this, risk everything for the off chance that she can go home, is heartwarming.

There’s a rustle in the woods.

Beau immediately looks up, and Caduceus stands. The firbolg tilts his head, then his eyes widen. “Oh. Oh. Uh, Vilya, you might want to come here.”

“What is it?”

“It seems they overshot it.”

Yasha looks a little excited at the prospect of new people. “Who overshot what?” Everyone is now standing, but Vilya can’t help but notice that they’re protecting her, standing in a semi-circle that would keep the newcomers from hurting her immediately.

Jester cups her hands. “Allura! Hello?”

The sound of more rustling, then a soft voice. “That’s her! That’s Jester, the one I was speaking to.”

Jester brightens. “That’s the voice! Hello, mystery woman! I am Jester, we’re over here!”

More rustling, and then a rather unusual group of individuals emerge from the forest. There are a few humans, a goliath, a respectable number of gnomes, a halfling, even a bear, but Vilya’s eyes are immediately drawn to the two half-elven women towards the back. One of them is raven-haired, bird feathers in a braid, obvious ranger's gear and a bow that screams of a story.

Clinging to her arm, cloaked in the Mantle of the Tempest, face red with tears, taller than Vilya and bearing the weight of everything, is Keyleth. That’s her girl, that’s her daughter, her _baby_ , standing right there at the edge of the group. 

Vilya pushes through the Nein, and raises her arms.

“Mama?”

“Hello, sweetpea.”

~~

“Hello, sweetpea.” Vilya whispers into her newborn’s ear, lips pressed against the soft skin of her daughter.

Her parents have already come and gone, cooing over the little bundle, thanking Korrin for looking after their little girl. Her parents, also the current Voice of the Tempest and her cleric husband, have informed the rest of the Ashari that it is a little girl, with the beginnings of red hair and a strong spirit.

Vilya doesn’t want to let go.

Korrin is curled up beside her, one hand in Vilya’s hair, the other being held by their baby girl in her sleep. He hasn’t moved, either, simply staring at the both of them. Their daughter is swaddled in soft green cotton, cotton that managed to be the same colour as her eyes. How Thuda does it is a mystery that is clearly not solved by time. Two cups of herbal tea seat on the bedside table, not Thuda’s usual brew but a Korrin specialty that it seems only the two of them love.

“We really should pick a name.” He half-whispers, like he is afraid that speech any louder will shatter some illusion they failed to notice.

“Hm. Any ancestors sad they missed the wedding?” She jokes, and he laughs into her shoulder.

“We are awful. Let’s name her after a herb and be done with it.” He half-jokes.

“I am not naming my daughter after a herb.” She looks down at her, at her daughter. Something clicks, like the way well-fitting armour snaps into place, the way a well-made table is unbreakable. “Keyleth. Her name is Keyleth.”

“Keyleth.” Korrin thinks, rolling it around on his tongue like a taste. “I like it.” He scoots, looking down at their daughter - at Keyleth. “Hello Keyleth, I’m Korrin, your father. I promise to always give you sweets when your mother isn’t looking, and to make sure that you become a respectable druid and learn how to be a bear first.”

“Oh please.” Vilya shifts Keyleth in her arms. “Hello, Keyleth, I’m Vilya, your mother. One day, you will bear the entire weight of your people on your shoulders, and the four winds will bow to your every whim. But first, you will be my daughter. I will teach you every song that fills these mountains, and I will make sure that you become a powerful druid, and learn how to be a wolf first. It is tradition for us to bear claws, little one, though we never, ever, bear bear claws.”

“You’re terrible.” Keyleth yawns in her sleep, and the two stare at her.

Vilya inhales a breath around the need to sob, the need to climb the mountain and scream that this is her daughter and none will harm her. “Hello, Keyleth.”

~~

“Hello, Keyleth.”

Keyleth takes a shaky step forward, leaning heavily on a staff covered in berries. “Mama?” Keyleth reaches out, tentatively, like she’s expecting her to disappear.

Vilya steps forward in turn, letting Keyleth’s hand reach her palm and feel the flesh, the pulsing blood and the very tangible and real hand of her mother. Keyleth breaks, face contorting into grief-tainted relief, and reaches forward, pulling Vilya into a hug.

“Mama, oh my god, oh, _Mama_ -” She sobs into her shoulder, and Vilya’s hands immediately fly to her hair under the circlet - and what a circlet, what a daughter, what a _Voice_ \- running her hands in soothing strokes through her hair.

“Shh, sweetpea. I have you, I have you. Don’t be afraid, Keyleth.”

“Mama.” Keyleth’s arm’s tighten, and Vilya moves her arms so that she can squeeze and hold her back.

“I have you.”

~~

“I have you! I have you!” Jade shouts, holding fast to Vilya, who is still reeling from a hard blow from the kraken. “This is insane!”

“I know! What are they thinking?” She shouts back, taking in the situation. The kraken is far stronger than they had expected. Yes, it is a kraken in its home domain, but they are normally rather simple to handle.

This one is not.

“We have to get out of here! I don't want anyone dying for this!” She looks around for the others. Prim and Ophelia are closest to the portal, Prim clearly heavily injured, Ophelia appearing to be a little okay. Vilya keeps looking around.

She can’t see the twins. “Where are the twins!?” She looks at Jade, who goes white and points up. Vilya follows, and gasps, blood running cold.

Futz is limp in one tentacle, Clank furiously trying to free them. There’s a tentacle reaching for Clank, and Vilya reacts on instinct. A bolt of fire shoots from her palm and erupts against the tentacle. The kraken screeches, the tentacle whipping her direction. Vilya tries to swim away, to duck, to move.

The only thing she hears after the crack of the tentacle against her skull is screaming.

“Vilya!”

~~

“Vilya. What a pity you have returned to such a broken life.” Vokodo chitters when she returns to the cave, the Mighty Nein and Vox Machina - her heart aches with her party who never got a name - behind her.

“Vokodo.” Pure, unbridled rage fills every fiber of her being as she swims deeper into the chamber, stopping a fair distance away from the creature who took everyone from her.

“You enjoyed servitude under me, rodent. Do not make me regret saving you.” The hoard clinks as Vokodo moves closer, coins and armour reflecting off of the faint light they have brought with them.

“Saving me? _Saving me?_ You took my leg, you took my past and my things, mementos for people who are long since dead, you took my family, the thousands of people who needed me to be someone that I can’t be anymore because of you. But, most of all, the greatest sin of all, you overgrown squid-looking son of a _bitch_ , you took my husband from me, and you took my daughter from me.”

Vokodo’s laugh is like two ships crashing into each other, a screeching rumble that bounces through the cave. “Oh? The little weed has come to make demands.”

“I got my daughter back, buddy. About time you gave us our things back.”

The water in the cave begins to heat. “I am a god!”

“You are _nothing_ more than a hermit crab with a god complex, and if it takes all of us to teach you that lesson, then so be it.”

“Keeks, your mum is, like, super cool.” Someone says from behind her.

“Yeah, I know.” Keyleth replies, and Vilya inwardly beams.

Vokodo moves further into the centre of the cavern, beaked mouth shaped into what could be considered a snarl.

Vilya snarls back.

~~

Vilya snarls back. Her mother, laughing, scoops her into her arms and away from the very annoyed badger Vilya has discovered with her six-year-old curiosity.

“Yeah! Stay out of my garden!” She yells from her mother’s arms, sticking her tongue out for good measure.

“Vilya, that’s mean to the badger.”

“He was eating the roses and the heather! It’s not fair.” She pouts, and her mother presses a kiss to her cheek, laughing as she does so. Anger and fury is always funny on a child, especially when said child has a few twigs in her hair.

“Come, I want you to help me with the Mantle.” Vilya gasps, hands flying to her cheeks.

“Really? You said I had to be way older to touch the Mantle.”

“You must wear it, one day. Teaching you how to care for it is best done when young.” Vilya’s mother puts her down, and Vilya runs to the room where her mother works on things, like embroidery and Druidic rituals and baking, her mother following close behind. “Now, Vilya, get me the deep green thread, you know the one.”

The Mantle is kept on a stand, every leaf catching the light as if it still remained on the tree. The thread in question is at the bottom of a sizable pile of threads and beads that Vilya’s mother uses to adorn things. Vilya pulls it from the pile.

~~

Vilya pulls it from the pile. The mirror, the one she scried on Keyleth with, Keyleth’s woven bracelet still woven around the handle. She lifts it from the mess, and almost begins to weep with the weight of what this means. A few days ago, she would have led a one-woman mission to tear Vokodo limb from limb - they did so anyway, but decimating a false god is always fun with friends - to retrieve this mirror and what it promised. And now?

She does not need to scry on her daughter every day, because her daughter is a few strokes away and helping sort out the monumental hoard. Not all of it can be transported, of course, some of these items are beyond reasonable in size, but things like gems are always helpful for those who travel a more dangerous path.

“Find something you recognise?” Lady De Rolo asks, and Vilya nods.

“I would scry on Keyleth every day with this. I couldn’t be there for her when she was growing up, I thought this was-” Her voice cracks, and the Lady places a hand on her shoulder.

“She knows. She knows how much she means to you, believe me.”

“I highly doubt I had that much of an impact, I have been gone for almost her entire life.” Vilya counters, and the Lady smiles.

“Keyleth approached us in Wildshape, you know that?”

“You know that I don’t.”

The Lady huffs a laugh. “She was a squirrel. Told me some time later it reminds her of her mother.” She walks back to the others, leaving her alone, which is much better than having a witness to the silent tears. Vilya keeps rummaging, finding nothing. Fjord finds Ophelia’s locket, containing a drawing of _them_ , swept in by the tide from the Plane of Water. She binds it, along with the bracelet, to the mirror.

“Let’s get outta this dank cave!” Veth shouts, and the whoops and cheers from Jester and Veth seem to lift the mood. Laughter begins to flit between them, and Vilya is about to resign herself to a trip alone when the large Goliath moves next to her.

He is silent, but in a way that tells Vilya that he’s done something like this before. She forgets to ask him, however, because upon emerging back onto the island he challenges Beau to a friendly spar, and the friendly atmosphere is no place to dredge up old ghosts.

~~

Zephrah hasn’t changed.

The sun is only now just rising, peering over the mountains and down on Vilya and Keyleth. “I, ah, I have to confess something.”

“What?”

“I didn’t tell Dad about this. I didn’t want to give him hope if it was fake. But you're real, so...” Keyleth gestures to the main road.

“Where would he be?”

Keyleth shrugs, eyes watering. “Where he always is at seven o’clock. Lighting a small fire to brew two cups of an awful herbal tea that I refuse to drink.”

“Why two cups?” Vilya asks.

“Because one of them is meant for you.” Vilya’s heart breaks, shatters into thousands of pieces. “If you hurry, you can get there before the kettle boils.”

Vilya runs.

Zephrah is beginning to wake, so the few people she sees as she sprints through the main streets do a double take. A few call her name - one of them is Ador, hair now white, who drops a pot and screams her name when she tears past them - but she doesn’t stop, just keeps running to the house towards the top of the hill where the sunlight sits the most, because Korrin is there and she hasn’t seen him in almost forty years and he _still brews her tea_.

The door is open, because Korrin refuses to believe in locks, and she swings it open with such force she’s mildly aware that she's going to break something, but she doesn’t care. Korrin is in the main room, and he starts from where he sits.

“Melora give me strength, what the he-” He trails off, staring at her.

“Korrin?” She whispers, standing straight.

“Vi- _Vilya_?” He replies, walking towards her. She nods, unable to speak, and the second his hands brush hers she sobs and pulls him in. He holds her, tears streaming down his own face and into her clothes, an awful noise ripping from his chest, the sound a wounded animal makes when it wants to live but knows it must die.

They stay there in the doorway for quite some time.

Neither notice when the kettle boils.


End file.
